Category: Australian rules

The Sunshine Coast is known for it’s beaches, national parks and Australia Zoo. There is also the triathlons in Noosa and Mooloolaba.

Just under this layer is a whole host of other events that the wider audience may not know about.

I’m talking of course about the various sporting Grand Finals. The Sunshine Coast Rugby Union’s SGQ Cup Grand Final drew an estimated 800 spectators at the University of the Sunshine Coast ground. The choice to hold the game out “in the suburbs” as opposed at Sunshine Coast Stadium provided a more intimate atmosphere.

This atmosphere is something that only a local country ground can provide. At some grounds, spectators can drive right up to the boundary fence and watch the contest from this vantage point. At most grounds, one can park within 100 metres of the ground.

The Caloundra Cricket Club even has a park bench or two so a spectator can have a feed while watching the game. Clubs will also have a canteen on site with some also having a bar.

If driving isn’t your thing, public transport is available to the vast majority of grounds. The stops are always within walking distance of each venue. Hotels and other accommodation providers tend to have transport information on hand so finding your way around shouldn’t be too hard.

If you are traveling with children, most venues will have an area that they can run around in if they get restless. While these will vary in size, they should be sufficient to keep them happy.

Anyone wanting to experience sport with a country feel but without the feeling of being too far from anywhere will enjoy the Sunshine Coast.

The football codes run their seasons from April to September while the cricketers play from October to March. Roller Derby fans are encouraged to contact the local association to check their schedule.

An interesting article came across my twitter feed this afternoon. Apparently the Australian Football League has approached Google to broadcast matches live on YouTube. If this is true it would not be anything new in the sporting world. It wouldn’t even be new for Australian rules football.

The North East Australian Football League streams one or two games live each week.

The North East Australian Football League broadcast games through their YouTube channel each week. Even the representative game gets broadcast.

If the AFL follows the NEAFLs model, the audience will be able to watch replays of the match without said replay being otherwise uploaded.

There are, however, a couple of issues with Google getting the rights. First is Australia’s anti-syphoning laws. In short these laws require curtain events to be offered for broadcast to Free to Air television networks. The list of events includes all AFL matches. Channel Seven have, in recent years, waived outright five matches each week. The other four matches they’ve only waived in part.

The other issue the Australian Football League would face is internet bandwidth. The AFL would be looking at about nine or ten gigabytes per match. There being nine matches each week, this works out to be about ninety gigabytes a week. An audience member watching even a three or four games would chew through there home data allowance fairly quickly, their mobile data definitely.

As you can probably understand, content that previously was the domain of television, cinema and home video is increasingly reformatted to sought an online audience. One could look at the advent of YouTube and BitTorrent as examples here.

A half hour television programme lasts about twenty two minutes once the ad breaks are taken out. An hour programme lasts 44-45 mnutes. This is standard industry practice.

The internet doesn’t need these deliverables. Shows can last from about four to five minutes for a comedy show up to a proper half hour for a review show.

Even sport, which normally takes up about two to three hours is slowly going online. Though it must be said that the sporting broadcasts that I’ve seen purpose made for online vary greatly in the style of production from those purpose made for television.

The above video is of the North East Australian Football League match between Sydney University and Eastlake. It was produced for and presented live on YouTube. Yes YouTube does have that feature. As you can tell watching it, the production crew filmed it with a single camera.

Television broadcasters like Fox Sports have about eight cameras – with corresponding number of operators – for the same type of content. The multicamera setup used here provides a sort of safety net in the event the main camera is obstructed from viewing the action. Trust me, I’ve been operating a main (only) camera the kept getting obstructed and it’s annoying as buggery.

Oh well, things happen. We will probably see more content purposely made for online. Television won’t be completely gone for quite a while yet.

Patrick Gillett
(The image of the cameraman in licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution license and attributable to me)